Memorial Day Road Trip Prep

We’re hitting the road again.

We can’t help ourselves.  Actually, this time around the trip was not of our design but someone else’s.  One of Hubby’s cousins is turning 16 and her family is throwing her a big Sweet Sixteen Bash in Rhode Island this weekend.  Since almost all of his side of the family is in Miami, we want to attend the party and visit with the few family members that are up North. So that means…road trip!

I’m a little scared about it – Providence is a good 7-hour drive from the DC Area and I’m so not keen on long distance treks in the car with our three crazies.  But forget about the actual drive, there’s so much prep to do!  My car was in sad, sad shape (think: crayon, french fry and lip gloss build-up in the backseats) and so Hubby took it to be detailed last weekend so that we wouldn’t have to sit in a pool of gunk for 14 hours. Bless him.

Then, I had to take my girls to get their hair done last night.  They wear their hair in braids because: (1) it looks great; (2) it saves us so much time; (3) we don’t have to worry about swimming and bathtime; and (4) I am pathetic at doing hair (it’s ok – I’ve decided that I’m great at many things, but doing hair isn’t one of them).  So we made the 30-minute drive to their hair salon and spent the requisite 3 hours there.  Hubby took L’il Buddy to get his haircut yesterday, so we’re all set in the hair department.

Oh wait, I’m lying – I forgot about me! I’ll hit the salon today or tomorrow.

Next, I had to get everyone outfitted. I got the voicemail on Tuesday from Hubby: “The girls need dresses for the party. Click.” It sounded so serious.

Finding a frock for Giggles is always easy – pretty, pink and flowy and she’s a happy camper.  And I never have to beg her to wear her dressy shoes.  They are her preferred go-to.

Chatterbox is the complete opposite – I scoured the racks of Marshall’s for anything non-pink, non-frilly and non-flowy.  If she had her druthers, she’d wear jean shorts and city sneakers to the shindig.  I lucked out and found a subdued indigo dress that had a little bit of swagger:

And she approved. Phew.  Then we went and found her some non-pink, non-strappy shoes to go with:

I also found L’il Buddy some adorable dress shoes but have yet to find him an outfit.  That’s on tap for today.

Perhaps the biggest challenge was finding a place to stay.  Who knew that Providence was where it was at for Memorial Day Weekend?  Apparently everyone but me.  I waited until the absolute last minute (i.e. day before yesterday) to book our hotel room.  Almost everything is sold out thanks to Brown University graduation and the ones that have availability are $400+  I ended up finding one that was decently priced, had 1 room left (with just a King bed, oy) and has mixed reviews, so wish us luck.  We’ll be packing an air mattress for the kiddos.

Tomorrow we’ll need to pick up the 150 party linens in Hubby’s pickup truck, 30 minutes away, and take them to his other cousin who is driving them up along with 4,365 homemade mini desserts that she’s bringing for the event.  That should be an all-day project. Maybe I should get my hair done today after all.

Right now I’m off to Forever 21 to get the birthday girl the gift card of her dreams.

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